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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24321175">There Are No Good Men Left (This World of Yours Will Be Mine)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MousesizeDragon/pseuds/MousesizeDragon'>MousesizeDragon</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Also nobody goes beyond verbal insinuations and hair pulling, An I Broke It Further, Angst with a Happy Ending, At least if they know what’s good for them, Because Nobody Else Can Be Trusted, Because they’re in public, Betrayal, Brainwashing, But secretly I was the one doing the forcing, Cannibalism, Child Death, Everybody Hates Hashirama, Everybody Loves Tobirama, Exhibitionism, F/M, For some people, Gen, Genius Senju Tobirama, Guys I’m the first person to ever ship Tobirama with Matatabi on here, He Founded a Hive Mind, He dies but comes back literally the next second, He is beset upon all sides, He is the Queen, I do what’s necessary attitude, I guarantee there is no actual sex in this fic, I think I’m done tagging, I was forced to do it!, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, It’s not non-con if you’re playacting with yourself, I’m not sure if he’s the villain or the hero but he’s the main character, Major Character Undeath, Manipulation, Multiple identities, Murder, Nibi | Two-tails | Matatabi is a Troll, Nibi | Two-tails | Matatabi is a cat, No Actual Slavery, Nobody Actually Gets Eaten, Not A Fix-It, Oblivious Senju Tobirama, Or your friend who has your permission, Poor Izuna, Revenge, Romantic tags are all nonsense, Senju Tobirama Needs a Hug, Senju Tobirama centric, Senju Tobirama is a Troll, Senju Tobirama is a cat, Served Ice Cold and a Decade Later, Slavery, That's it That's literally what this story is about, This fic is way kinkier than it should be, Time Travel, Tobirama Did Not Found a Village, Tobirama has multiple identities, Tobirama is the whole damn self-sufficient hive, Undercover, Unhappy for Others, Warring States Period (Naruto), We can all go home now, and Tobirama does not have sex in public, and also way less kinky than it sounds, especially not with bijuu or himself, maybe some licking, most of them don’t actually happen anyway, one of them is a slave to the other, that would be improper</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 04:55:09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>8,444</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24321175</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MousesizeDragon/pseuds/MousesizeDragon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Tobirama doesn’t understand what happened, what he did wrong, why Hashirama doesn’t love him anymore, why he’s meeting with the Uchiha at the river and training with them (why Izuna and Madara and Hashirama all seemed to know his every move they’re even created). Then he’s pushing limits that shouldn’t be pushed and banished from the Clan. (And he’s only eleven do they expect him to survive?)</p>
<p>It’s the moment before he dies when the line between death and life and past and future present thins when he realizes. Hashirama came back. (Back from the future, who knows if it was from his own first death or from the end of the Fourth War, but either way he’s had three years now and what he did was train with the Uchiha brothers and isolate Tobirama (pushed him to the edge and over).) Tobirama, who died for the village, for his students, then again for the hope of future generations, will not let this stand.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Nibi | Two-tails | Matatabi &amp; Senju Tobirama, Senju Tobirama/Nibi | Two-Tails | Matatabi, Senju Tobirama/Senju Tobirama, Senju Tobirama/Uzumaki Mito</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>110</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>392</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. There Are Only Revenants Here</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">


        <li>
            Inspired by

            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/19382323">Ripples</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Martesh/pseuds/Martesh">Martesh</a>.
        </li>
        <li>
            Inspired by

            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/19749847">Five Years later</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilili_cat/pseuds/Lilili_cat">Lilili_cat</a>.
        </li>

    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was an idea I had reading a couple other stories. The one story is from Tobirama’s point of view where when he’s 8 Hashirama gets up one morning and is different, and outside POV on Hashirama and Madara time traveling into the past and messing things up. The point where Tobirama is banished from the Senju Clan is where this story starts/branches off. Because the second story was also based on the first story and has young Tobirama’s ghost haunting the river where they build Konoha because he died when he got kicked out. I had the thought of what if he didn’t quite die, but got all his future memories like they did.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>A child dies at the edge of a river. Betrayed by the one he called brother, his last brother, cast out of his family for doing his duty, following their orders, shaping himself into the monster they told him to be. You must be better (how does he know, how does he always already know, why is he laughing at me while he tries to kill me, he is not taking me seriously, I’m going to die, they’re going to die).</p><p>He spends every moment of every day certain that he will fall beneath Izuna’s blade as soon as the other boy stops toying with him. For all his supposed intelligence nothing he does is good enough. (Was it a game for the Uchiha? To see what cliff edges he could push the other child to? What do you do when your opponent knows the things that come from your mind as you create them? (How does he know?) How far must you push to escape? How do you fight someone who appears to read your mind before you even finish a thought? You outpace yourself. You reach for more, it reaches back.) (And now he realizes that his real enemy was Anija all along. Do you see what they did? What they pushed him to.)</p><p>Tormented for years by fear (if you die who will protect Anija) and an enemy who toyed with him on the battlefield, an enemy fed his every move and weakness by his brother (kin slayer, betrayer, I am dead because of you, Anija). A child of water drowns. Does he? He dies face down in the river of fever and sickness and heartbreak and betrayal and WHY Anija? (You said love but never once showed it.) A boy abandoned collapses, drags himself to the water where he is safe (he is so hot, so so thirsty) it has always been part of him more than anything else and yet he drowns. Even this last piece of his own soul has turned on him (wasn’t ever fully safe you’d remember that if they hadn’t betrayedwhyfeversickhotdyingAnijawhy). A dead man rises in the child’s place. </p><p>Dead protecting Anija’s dream. In Anija’s role, (I never wanted this, you were supposed to lead) why would you leave me. Protect the children. Children. He was a child. (I am the child? The child was betrayed. Was not me, could have been. Why are you punishing him for my sins? Why are you blaming me for living instead of dying? It was not murder, this was murder, why did you murder him? Anija why have you killed me?) A child dies and the lines between past and future, dead and alive, were already blurred. Two souls given a second chance (to plot betrayaldeathWHYabandonedIneverABANDONEDyouYOURdream). His Anija (notAnija, not yours, not his, mine, my Anija has betrayedkilled a child, this childme) has been lying to him for years now. As the child dies a third soul (playing with death, you should not have stolen from the shinigami) returns. (Child? I will not let this happen again.)</p><p>Fever frozen out, water rushing from lungs, he glows green and blue, chakra burning through this body in ways it never has before (not in this life, not yet, too young, different paths, a child, why, you have sentenced a child to death) as he wakes to reclaim life. Frost crystals spiral into being beneath his fingertips as he claws his way out of the river. He leaves the white pelt that accompanied him to his death twice now behind in the muck of the riverbank. (Not yours. You have renounced me. I renounce you in turn. You are as good as Kin-slayer Anija. I have died twice for you, because of you. Never again.) There should be justice shouldn’t there? (Why do I not deserve even the same respect as our enemies?)</p><p>Hashirama should have executed him in person if he wanted him gone. He died for Hashirama and this, the torment and death of a child that could have been but WAS NOT him, is how he has been repaid. Tobirama wakes and he is nothing but himself. (He is beholden to no one and has nothing else to lose. He should not have been, there is a reason for tethering, binds of duty and love and clan. A man, a child, willing to raise the dead should not have been set free in the world. When everything has been taken and taken and he gave and gave all the way to death and was given nothing but hate and another death in return.)</p><p>Senju Tobirama is dead.</p><p>Senju Tobirama is betrayed. </p><p>Senju Tobirama is killed (brought back killed brought back) and killed but he wakes. </p><p>How could he be anything but a vengeful ghost?</p><p>(No more dead children? You’re a liar Hashirama.)</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Somethings You Lose</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>This is the man whose student grew up to steal children and brand silence into servants of his own creation because willingness to kill the one you love most was not loyal enough to trust. This is the man whose student plotted the massacre of an entire clan. And whose other students let it happen because it was easier for them. That other student who allowed a man to be sacrificed to peace with another village because it was a quicker end to negotiations even when they were the ones in the wrong. This is a man whose students have no problem sacrificing children and soldiers and civilians so long as their plans are the ones that move forward. </p>
<p>(Maybe, maybe he taught his students to be practical and they heard cruel, he said efficient and they learned ruthless, maybe. But is that not a fault in the teacher? So his students outlived most of their peers, why is that? Somehow, even while dying so they could live on, he taught them all to put themselves first.)</p>
<p>(Everything you have ever touched has fallen to pieces, corrupt and rotten, how can you be certain this doesn’t happen again.) </p>
<p>This man crawls out of his grave and says never again. He glares at the world that killed him and says I will have vengeance and I will have loyalty. (No one will ever betray me again.)</p>
<p>This is a man made of nightmares the human race has not dreamed of yet. (Or perhaps there are those who have dreamed of a village, country, world, where there is no question of loyalty, no worries of betrayal. Is it loyalty if there is no choice but to give it?) He is a man, for now. This was a child who does not understand why you cannot raise yourself friends made of bones. This child grew up, and then, even worse, he didn’t.</p>
<p>The problem is (there are many problems) resurrection is tricky. It requires sacrifice. Always. Even if you are resurrecting yourself, even if you were only on the brink of death and not yet fully dead. (Split seconds mean more when the death isn’t drawn out.) The problem is you shouldn’t heal yourself, you shouldn’t mess with your own brain, (no matter how high the fever is, rapid cooling can be just as bad) you need to be very careful pulling fluid out of lungs, then problem is that when you’re dying and living and dying all at once and you have no choice but to save yourself because you’re the only one who will (betrayed) but for all your experimentation you’ve never been a healer. Sometimes people make mistakes. But who can say you’re one of them, after all there’s no one here but you.</p>
<p>Tobirama walks away from the river but something is definitely left behind. Death requires payment to avoid.</p>
<p>(That’s fine. He has what he needs. The rest is just extra.)</p>
<p>The problem is that Tobirama is still human for all he might wish otherwise.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. There's Blood Caked in the Valleys Between Your Teeth</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tobirama surveys the world, cracks his knuckles, and gets down to the business of taking it over. </p><p>He also indirectly loses even more loved ones. Someday something good will happen to him. But probably not today.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tobirama doesn’t know how to be without devoting himself completely. Before it was his brother (his brother’s dream, his brother’s happiness), it was the children (his students, his brother’s dream, the Will of Fire), and it was his research. But there was room for nothing more, and even then research was dropped if his brother wanted it to be or if his students needed him, and training his students was postponed when his brother needed him. Something must come before all else. He doesn’t have enough room in his heart for much.</p><p>Now? Now he has one goal, or two intertwining goals if they must be examined. An end to betrayal and an end to the deaths of children. (There must be someone to hold above all others, even if that someone is dead, and once it was Hashirama but now it both is and isn’t the child Hashirama sentenced to die.)</p><p>To that end the first thing he does is write a letter. (He writes many many letters. Over the years none of the Senju or the Uchiha will realize that their downfall, the downfall of the Land of Fire, may have ended with ink on skin but is started with ink on paper.)</p><p>They were Tobirama’s friends weren’t they. People who understood him more than he’d ever been understood by anyone in either life. They deserved to know who to be wary of. Hashirama wouldn’t catch them unaware. (Madara won’t steal them too.)</p><p>The second thing he does is design himself a new face. As a single clan-less shinobi the more contacts he can make the better. But oh, Senju Tobirama is dead (is safer if he stays that way while he is still such an easy target for Hashirama or Madara). It would not do to let anyone see him as young and distinctive as he is (there is no one he can trust, not yet). He needs to be someone else, someone who can afford to have a reputation.</p><p>An illusion anchored within instead of out, much harder to see through or dispel, perhaps? Thoughts for later improvement. For now he needs to decide what to look like. What will be the face to show the world; he goes about creating someone to some day stand against the ‘God of Shinobi’ in at least the political arena if not the battlefield and it’s almost fun. (He wants to be there to see Madara shudder when he catches sight of this. He hopes they meet during a diplomatic event that calls for them to be agreeable to one another.) What he needs is to become someone who people will follow, will follow to a future of safety and children growing into adults before they are allowed onto a battlefield, someone to offer a better option than Konoha.</p><p>The third thing he does, which is not at all third because it happens over a year later, unless you group many jobs, MUCH experimentation, and the establishment of a home base all together as a part of the second thing, is find the bijuu. After all they ought to know that the men who would chain them and use them and destroy them to recreate the Juubi are living with all the knowledge as to how to do it again. He picks carefully, so carefully, which of them feels the calmest and travels and shares with them enough of his memories of both the original sealing of them and of the Fourth Shinobi War so that they know and believe and can share with their siblings. Because even if you hate your siblings it’s very hard to want them to die. Suffer, yes, of course, but also live a long and somewhat unhappy life.</p><p>So first through third he makes allies. And as he does this he learns how to MAKE allies. (Sneaks into every prison or overly self important lord’s dungeon along the way and tests. And tests. And tests. It wouldn’t do to melt his allies’ brains or destroy their nervous systems or kill them in what appears to be excruciating pain in response to the first act of disloyalty. No, better to leave them alive for questioning but prevent the act itself.)</p><p>Fourth, when he is almost fourteen (growth rates perfectly on track, body healthy, chakra developing excellently (younger child-him-but-not was so creative), he had personally trained students and helped design the Academy; he knew how to optimize the development of a still growing body) he decides it’s time to regain his summoning contract. Although they didn’t like being called for direct battle, and tended to refuse if they were, the cheetahs were great and loyal messengers. With his chakra increasing the thrust of his footsteps and augmenting his muscles he can finally go fast enough, for long enough, to succeed in the race to regain the right to sign their scroll.</p><p>(There will be no admitting that he misses those he was closest to in his last life. There will be no admitting that once upon a future that will never happen he’d smiled when his summons had called Hashirama and him a coalition and that he’d had to laughingly explain to one litter of young that while caring for one another and living together and protecting the same territory were remarkably like a cheetah coalition that did not also mean that human brothers shared mates, or competed over potential mates, in the same way. Once Mito was chosen to wed Hashirama they belonged to one another and there was no competition as the choice was made by the Clan or Family Head.) </p><p>(It had hurt to explain that the reason he was not ‘mated’ and had no cubs to introduce to them was because his Clan Head, brother, had not seen fit to arrange a match for him yet, because it was his duty as Hashirama’s heir to wed for the benefit of the Clan and he could not go about ‘mating’ outside of that, and now he realizes that maybe he had always been an afterthought to Hashirama. Maybe he was always one misstep away from death, maybe his life was always a ready bargaining chip, maybe Hashirama hadn’t wanted him to have children or a legacy of any kind beyond passing on his jutsu creations to loyal Konoha nin. Maybe Hashirama never cared back.) </p><p>He reverse summons himself and when he sees where he is something shatters. He stands in a jungle (this is not right), feels the jagged edges of hope (the only loved ones he could keep) slice their way out of his chest and he doesn’t let himself move. Breathe, be a shinobi, breathe, remember, fudoshin, breathe, there is no other option. </p><p>To summon without a contract sends you to the home of the summons that is closest to you, the ones who resonate with your soul, to the ones that are like you and that you in turn are like, the place that you would call home if you had been born an animal. (Spirit animals, some civilians joke, but that’s as close to truth as anything can be.) That he is not in the familiar brush lands where the cheetahs make their home means that he is no longer one of them.</p><p>(Only now he realizes - so that is what I left behind. Myself.)</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>SO, so, so. This is where we shoot way off course and into the void of AUs. Although, can you say brother complex? Tobirama might not have had one before but he probably has one now. (In a Hashirama knows what he's doing and he doesn't make mistakes and I hate him and he's wrong, sort of way.) (Honestly what Tobirama lost was his moral compass aka Hashirama. It's big part of who he was so he's kind of completely rediscovering himself which is always hard to do but especially hard when you're on your own in a body going through puberty and mentally you feel like you should be about 50 by now.)</p><p>Uh, I'm positive that you're all aware but Naruto ninjas are not at all like real life ninjas. But real life ninjas were badass and super cool so I'm going to argue that there are legit ninjas in the Naruto world (like ANBU and stuff) but we were following a front-liner (Naruto) so we didn't see a lot of them in action. But some of the shinobi rules we did hear about in the manga were similar to RL shinobi rules/principles. And so Tobirama was for the most part a front-liner, and he's fighting against 2 of the strongest front-liners to ever exist, which means now he's gonna have to get back to his true shinobi roots to have any hope at beating them. To that end there's like 3 main guiding principles of actual ninjas that are going to be referenced in this fic.</p><p>1.) fudoshin - the unwavering mind - Which is the discipline of keeping your mind still (calm and focused) no matter what happens. It's about training the mind to be strong so that anything can happen at any time but the ninja is ready to calmly make a decision.</p><p>2.) hijo no kokoro - the unfeeling heart - Which is the principle that the 'true heart' of the ninja is to carry out their orders no matter what, doing everything in their power to succeed. Which is to say that justice and righteousness, telling the truth, mercy, compassion, hesitation all need to be shut out if they might interfere with the job.</p><p>3.) reading people - okay, no special name because this is something English has a name for! (shocker, English: None of the discipline and all the manipulation) - Ninja are all about infiltration, and sometimes you have to infiltrate the enemy's trust, get through their guard and get information. This is about manipulation and understanding how to approach someone to get what you need from them.</p><p>And lastly, can ya'll just look up cheetah social behaviors? Or ask and I'll answer in comments. All I'm gonna say is I agree with the Tobirama-is-a-big-cat trope so hard, and the head canon of snow leopard summons is adorable, but this time he was a cheetah and now he's something else. (Just imagine mama cheetah!Tobirama dragging around his six little cubs(students) and teaching them how to be big independent cheetahs while protecting them from predators while they're young. And then SOME of them run off and form a semi-evil coalition (Danzo) but that's another story.) But the whole cheetah thing is never gonna show up again beyond passing mention.</p><p>I apologize so hard for making this basically a second chapter.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Having Wandered Into The Abyss</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tobirama out here like - Damn, I’m gonna die ‘cause kid me thought face stripes were cooler than circles.</p><p>Summons Boss - I’m keeping him, yes, he’s mine now. No, I don’t care if he wants to be kept, I will make him want to be kept. I like how vicious he is. I’ll make him even worse.</p><p>Tobirama still not realizing what he has gotten himself into - Of course you can keep me, nobody else wants to.</p><p>Or, Tobirama teams up with a bunch of man-hating man-eaters to further his crusade against his ex-brother and the rest of the shinobi system.</p><p>Or, How the elemental continent got its first environmental conservationist who is willing to both brainwash and kill people to get shit done his way and believes that all cubs, excuse me <em>children</em>, also fall under his purview of protection.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Hello,” he turns towards where he can sense there is something with developed chakra coils. Though he can’t see what creature is there he knows someone is, and he can make guesses based on what he can sense, which is not as much as he should be able to (predatory, big, both like and unlike a cheetah, chakra flows in a way that means calculating thought not just impulsive reaction, anger, aggression, amusement?). It is always better to be polite, he learned some diplomacy cleaning up after Hashirama, organizing a village, and during his own time as Hokage but mostly he learned from Mito. “I apologize for the intrusion.” </p><p>“Well, well, you are a polite little thief, for once,” a deep voice rumbles out of the bushes with a distinctly snide tone coating every word. “I suppose Akari-sama would be disappointed if I killed you before giving her a chance to see such a unique looking thief.”</p><p>Tobirama does not flinch when a tiger that stands twice as tall as he currently does at its shoulder rises silently from where it must have been lying on the forest floor. It makes the largest specimen he’d ever seen in training ground 44 look small. He is almost four times the age he appears, he has died thrice over, if this is his end he will not flinch from it. He does not fear death (it is so apparently impermanent after all). Tobirama assumes that someone must have reverse summoned themselves here at some point in history, just based on the odds of probability although those do decrease depending on the number of different summoning animal clans out there, but he cannot recall any tales of anyone making it back. There have been no tiger summoners. </p><p>(He wonders if the tigers that moved into training ground 44 evolved to be larger or smaller or stayed the same over the course of the village’s growth. It’s a shame such things have to be observed over multiple generations, a shame he couldn’t live long enough to answer all his questions.)</p><p>“You’re lucky I was napping here today. Most would just kill you and bring your body to Akari-sama to look at later. This way you may live a few minutes longer. Stick close thief. I can’t guarantee someone else won’t kill you.” Tigers do not grin, that is most definitely a baring of teeth. In a moment the tiger is just as invisible as it was moments before and Tobirama is stuck racing through the trees following his sensing over his sight.</p><p>Barely an hour later they’ve made it to a lake. On the shore with it’s eyes closed is the head of a tiger so large that Tobirama could easily stand on its tongue and his hair probably wouldn’t even brush the roof of its mouth. Lying on its side its body stretches out into the lake, which really looks like a puddle compared to this tiger. He knows immediately why another tiger might want to give his body to this one; they’re white with red stripes after all. </p><p>He feels like laughing until he cries. Seals on your face to protect your skin and eyesight, counteracting the few weakness of being born albino that aren’t eliminated by chakra use, seem like such a good idea until you realize that you might just have pissed off a tiger whose teeth are the length of you body. Thief indeed. Can you even steal a pattern that naturally occurs in several other species?</p><p>“Akari-sama, I found a little thief in the forest,” the first tiger calls out in a sing-song tone. Seeing it step out from the shade of the trees and into the light of the clearing Tobirama realizes that the stripes he was assuming were black are most definitely a deep blue while the tawny orange between them has a distinctly yellow tint to it when not masked by the shadows of the forest. Which is interesting; in general the closer to the boss summons the animal is the less likely it is to have the same colorations as a standard animal of its species. He’s probably managed to land right next to the child or grandchild of the tiger clan leader. Possibly a niece or nephew depending on age. It’s hard to judge based on size when there’s also a tiger practically the size of a mountain in front of you, especially since he can hardly sense either one of them without concentration.</p><p>“Did you kill it?” It takes a quick application of chakra to the bottoms of his feet to stop himself from staggering when the vibrations from Akari’s bored voice shake the ground, probably because the tiger is laying right up against it, still. He’s not going to admit that he’s gotten in over his head, but, well, even the boss cheetah hadn’t been this big, probably because they weren’t front liners or even fighters if they could help it.</p><p>“No,” that sounds almost like a pout, oh Sage preserve him, he landed next to a teenager, didn’t he. A giant, killer teenager who could probably fit his head in their mouth who brought him home like a strange toy to show off. (Sage save him, he’s a killer teenager, isn’t he.) “I thought you’d like to see this one, it looks like you, and it’s polite, for a thief, it apologized for waking me up and didn’t demand we serve it.”</p><p>“Oh?” Water gushes off her sides as she shifts sit up on her stomach and stretches her paws out on either side of him, boxing him in and forcing him to look up even further. Straining to keep looking up at her face was already uncomfortable, not just because of the severe angle but also because it stretched his neck in what was practically an exposed invitation to slice it. “Oh. Yes. I see. How cute.”</p><p>What. He is, he was, Senju Tobirama: nobody has ever called him cute.</p><p>“Yes. Karen, thank you. I think I’ll keep him.” She, because behind all the rumble of an avalanche she does sound somewhat feminine and her name is Akari, does not smile, animals do not smile, she’s showing him her teeth and leaning in, she feels like she’s laughing at him but he can still sense so much aggression from her. He’s going to get eaten isn’t he. “Well little thief, if you can complete the test I will allow you to sign our scroll. That is what you came for, isn’t it? Unless you meant to go elsewhere.”</p><p>“So, now we have to do the test, can’t just kill them from the start anymore. I should’ve just eaten it,” the first tiger, Karen, grumbles. “How do we even know it wants to be kept?”</p><p>“Of course I would be honored to sign your scroll Akari-sama. I would hate to disrupt you though, I was indeed expecting to be sent elsewhere.” Or, please let me be on my way, I mean no harm, this is all a misunderstanding, you don’t need to put yourselves out by killing me. Should he tell her his name? Neither of them have asked, or even officially introduced themselves to him.</p><p>“Do you thieves come with foreknowledge now? One would assume that you would not know where you were going if this was indeed your first time coming. But of course it is and it isn’t.”</p><p>“What?” Karen has turned her eyes away from him, he’s assuming because again the name implies she is female, and it’s a relief to have only the one set of bright blue eyes cutting their way into his soul. Somehow Karen’s golden gaze was much more unnerving, perhaps because of her numerous threats to his life. Even if Akari also felt like she was a shrug away from biting his head off, literally not figuratively.</p><p>“You cannot sense it granddaughter but his chakra is far too strong in spirit for him to be really the age he appears. Human children, no matter the experience, cannot develop their mind quite this much while also balancing their body. Perhaps if he was raised in one of their religious groups dedicated to it, but then his yang would be lagging behind where it is. Besides, can you not smell the natural chakra on him?” Which is true, he has been experimenting with the safe extraction and use of ambient natural chakra to fuel the activation of semi-passive seals on non-chakra users, but he didn’t realize it had a smell. Do all types of chakra have a scent? Maybe she would let him ask questions if he passed her test.</p><p>“Well, it’s natural chakra, I assumed it was natural for him to have it.” Sage help him but her grumbling is cute. He’s going senile: first befriending bijuu and now he’s ready to coo at a tiger more than twice as tall as he is who wants to eat him. If he makes it back alive he’s never telling Matatabi or Kukuo.</p><p>Akari laughs and the trees shake. “Go, find at least one more of my grandchildren, pick your favorite if you like, and bring them back here for the test. And you, little thief,” she turns back to him as Karen slips away into the woods, “tell me your name and which realm you once belonged to. If you are going to join mine I will know what you were before.”</p><p>He tells her, because why not, there’s never been a tiger summoner and Karen implied that almost every other tiger would kill any human they came across pretty close to instantly. The cheetahs had required something similar, and interview of sorts, to make sure he was enough like them to come to an understanding before he was even allowed to participate in the race to earn the right to sign their scroll. So he tells her that once he was a Senju, a brother, a follower, a teacher, a leader, once he summoned cheetahs. Then he died and awoke in the past and he was no longer a Senju or a brother or a follower or a teacher or anything else he had loved and lived for in that life and he’d been trying to get back the one thing he could. But even that was somehow taken from him. </p><p>When he is done it has not been all that long, it probably did not take more than an hour at most to recount his entire life, not nearly as long as he would have assumed it would take even glossing over large parts of it, but he’s glad to have said even this much out loud. Sure, he spoke to the bijuu, but that was all about them and what had happened to them and how to prevent it. This was about him, what had been done to him and what he had done because of it, and it’s the first time he’s done this in either life. It hurts, he’s just ripped the scabs off his wounds to show her how deep they still are, but it also feels like standing in a cool stream after a battle against the Uchiha. (Fire users, the lot of them, battling them was always miserably hot, sweating in your armor from the flames and steam, and occasionally even cooking or burning in the overheated metal. He used to sneak out to swim in the river after particularly long or difficult battles, a lifetime ago when Madara and Hashirama were leading the clans against one another in war.)</p><p>“If you pass the test with my grandchildren then you will be our summoner.” She doesn’t comment on anything he says, but her chakra has no more amusement in it and slightly less aggression then before. “When they arrive you will go with them back to your realm and you will hunt with them. You will hunt down another thief and when you have made your kill you will bring it back to eat. Then you will be one of us; hunt with us, eat with us, and if you do then we will fight with you.”</p><p>“Do you have a specific human in mind?” Because by now he has realized that ‘thief’ means ‘human’ to the tigers. Human meat is really just meat once the human consciousness is gone, he doesn’t really see a need to associate the body with the person beyond being used as a conduit towards their resurrection if desired. It’s not like their soul is still hanging around, he knows that for certain. Over both lives he has dissected plenty of dead bodies, human and otherwise, and that’s all they are, dead flesh, but he’s read that it can make people sick to consume other humans. He knows, he knows, that this is is most definitely another taboo, although unlike raising the dead he can see why this would be off limits, if indeed it does cause sickness. He’s never been in a situation desperate enough to have to test that before. “I have read that it causes illness to eat the flesh of another human.”</p><p>“If that is your only objection then rest assured we won’t give you the brain. The rest of the body will not harm you to eat.” Akari feels like triumph. She knows he is going to go through with this. “You may choose the human you wish to hunt, but if the hunt does not prove you to be a worthy choice then we may still not allow you to join and your life will still be forfeit.”</p><p>“May I ask what would make a hunter worthy of joining you?” At this point he’s not quite sure if he’s agreeing to sign a summons contract or join a new clan, but he doesn’t really care. It has been far more lonely than he would ever have believed these last three years. What man who prefers quiet and solitude, who grows exhausted from too many social encounters and not enough time alone, ever guesses that he will grow sick of his isolation and long for the company of another? No one has hugged Tobirama since Butsuma sent his child into the world alone, no one had hugged Tobirama for almost a year before his death in a war torn world that will never be. Somehow it feels like so many more than three or four years (depending on how you count). He hadn’t even liked the too-tight overwhelming stranglehold of hugs back when Hashirama used to ambush him with them. While he’s not sure he would really want hugs if they were on offer he misses being part of a clan far more than he thought possible. He wonders if he might be allowed to watch the tigers’ cubs some day like the cheetahs had eventually permitted.</p><p>“You must be a strong enough hunter to kill on your own but you more importantly you must prove your intelligence. So many of you thieves gather together and rush straight at one another hacking away until one side or the other is dead.” She makes a huffing sound that is probably supposed to be a scornful laugh, what it is though is a sudden blast of noise and air right in his face that comes so close to knocking him off his feet that he ends up in an awkward crouch, even using chakra to stick his sandals to the dirt. He slowly straightens up while she continues. “Tigers are not so stupid as to go to war. We are hunters who stalk and ambush our prey. We are intelligent; when thieves move in to our territory and get rid of our prey we adapt. This is why we eat thieves. Thieves don’t taste particularly good, but when they take away everything else, what is left as prey but them? When they attack and injure us so we cannot hunt better food is it not right that we turn to them to replace what they have taken from us?”</p><p>“I suppose that is fair.” He hasn’t ever really thought about it. Tigers are both very rare and quite dangerous and they sometimes come out of the jungles they live in to eat villagers and have to be put down because of it. But he hadn’t really thought that of course tigers need food and when the humans cut down trees to make farmland what else could they eat but the farmers and their livestock. Tobirama is a human and he’s used to thinking of humans before every other species. It never really occurred to him that the animals were all living there before humans spread out across the continent. He’s changing, befriending the bijuu and building a safe haven where they can live as well, but it’s a slow process. (He is realizing that humans, as a whole, are naturally very self-centered.) “It isn’t just the bijuu that mankind is a threat to.”</p><p>“Exactly. The thieves are the ones who force us to attack them, because they attacked us first. If you wish for us to fight with you then you must be one of us before you are one of them.” Which leads perfectly back around to the hunting and eating a human as a trial. “We are not so exposed as our cousins in your realm but we will side with them before we side with a thief.”</p><p>“I have already committed myself to your trial. I will see it through,” he promises, and Tobirama does keep his promises.</p><p>“I hope you are ready then because my granddaughter has brought her two favorite cousins. I suspected as much, but there were others closer if she wanted to make this harder for you.” The way these tigers keep sneaking up on him is unnerving, he was considered the best sensor in the Land of Fire, possibly the whole of the Elemental Continent, last time he lived; regardless of his not yet fully developed body he was practically up to the same standards as his last lifetime, already knowing how to increase his sensing range and ability and stretching that to its limits and past constantly to survive these last few years as a lone shinobi. He should feel them from several kilometers away, not just barely notice their presence when they were only a couple yards past the tree line and had been pointed out to him.</p><p>“Welcome,” Akari tips her head toward the three tigers entering the clearing and takes a moment to let each of them dart over and rub their heads under her chin before continuing to speak. “Hayate and Haruki will go with Tobirama to hunt and Karen will follow and watch from a distance. If at any point one of them is injured either on purpose or through recklessness or inattention Karen will step in to kill Tobirama and any human witnesses. If Tobirama is successful in hunting with you then your kill is to be brought back here where we will finish the test by sharing a meal with him.”</p><p>She sends them out into the human realm and the only thing left for Tobirama to decide is what kind of person does he want to eat?</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>It’s already 3,000 words and I’m not even to the part were Tobi kills a man! *sobs at the thought of this ever growing fic which started with the one revenge scene set 10 years after the first chapter*</p><p>Go watch the youtube series “David Attenborough - Tiger - Spy In The Jungle - BBC” please.</p><p>Yes, tigers are color-coded by their dominant elements. They are difficult for Tobirama to sense because they are purposefully blocking themselves from being sensed, it’s something they train their cubs to do as they train them to hunt. Also there is more than one ‘Boss’ tiger. There are 3 matrilineal family lines and 3 patrilineal lines, aka 6 Boss level/size tigers each of whom technically has the right to accept a summoner however only that individual’s descendants would respect the summoner’s right to summon them unless the summoner proves themselves to the other family lines or individuals. Any tiger, obviously, belongs to at least 2 lines but has the right to choose which ones take priority. Basically it’s ‘which parent/grandparent/etc. do I like most’ when choosing which line to belong to. However since it is the mother who raises the cubs while they’re too young to be on their own 90 percent of the time tigers follow matrilineal loyalties. Of course they can switch loyalties, if they strongly disagree with a choice being made, or feel closer to another relative personality wise, (which is basically just moving away and telling people you follow a different Boss now) but there’s a general ‘we’re all allies and on the same side so nobody attacks anybody else but we’ll keep to our side of the forest’ agreement between everyone and occasionally all the Bosses meet up for a council if necessary. Not that tiger summons culture/politics really matter to any of you I’m sure.</p><p>Tiger Bosses:<br/>Coloration - Chakra/Element specialties - Physical Sex - Name</p><p>White with Red Stripes - sage, fire - Female - Akari 朱莉 [‘vermilion red’ ‘white jasmine’]<br/>White with Light Blue Stripes - sage, wind - Male - Sōma 颯真 [‘sound of the wind’ ‘genuine’]<br/>White with Dark Blue Stripes - sage, water - Female - Manami 愛海 [‘affection’ ‘ocean’]<br/>White with Yellow Stripes - sage, lightning - Male - Noriaki 則明 [‘rule/standard’ ‘light’]<br/>White with Green Stripes - sage, earth - Female - Chika 智花 [‘wisdom’ ‘flower’]<br/>Orange with Black Stripes - yin - Male - Tetsuo 哲雄 [‘wise’ ‘hero’]</p><p>A tiger must be a white tiger to use sage chakra, but since chakra works in (MAGIC) weird ways a tiger who was patient enough could potentially learn to be a sage and their fur would lighten to show they were a sage even if they weren’t born a white tiger. But born white (summons) tigers do have the ability to naturally use sage chakra without harm, but they still have to work to be good at it. And yes one of the Bosses is a lazy-ass Shikamaru-type guy who hasn’t become a Sage because it’s too much effort, although in his defense 3 of the rest of them were born white tigers so only 2 of them have gone through extra effort to be sages. He’s got other talents.</p><p>Other Tigers:</p><p>Karen 華蓮 [‘flower’ ‘lotus/water lily’]- has water as a main element and lightning as her secondary - Akari’s granddaughter, her father is Akari’s son, she’s several years older than Hayate and Haruki who are just barely considered adults, she’s a bit of an oddball rebel and followed her patrilineal-&gt;matrilineal family line to Akari’s family instead of her matrilineal-&gt;matrilineal to her other grandmother, which is why she calls her Akari-sama, most assume she has less connection to/claim to Akari than her other grandmother, especially since her other grandmother is Manami and they share a primary element. But Karen is like the Touka of the tiger world; don’t tell me what to do, I’ll be who I wanna be and do what I wanna do and you can try to stop me but I’ll gut you with glee.</p><p>Hayate 颯 [‘sound of the wind’] - has wind as main element with a strong earth secondary - Akari’s grandson, his mother is Karen’s father’s half sister (aka both are Akari’s children but not from the same litter or the same father) (I almost made him water and earth so Tobirama could help him figure out mokuton but nah, that has no real place in my fic except as yet another taunt/f-you to Hashirama, and would be just too much of a coincidence. He was almost named Hideki though, 秀樹, ‘excellent’ ‘tree’, because of the earth secondary, but I decided to be nice to Tobi for once.)</p><p>Haruki 陽輝 [‘light/sun’ ‘brightness’] - has fire as main element with a very strong lightning secondary - Akari’s grandson, is Hayate’s ‘twin’ in that the two of them are the same litter, it’s a small litter with just the two of them in it, he appears to have less stripes than average because his lightning secondary is so close to a second primary that he actually has a few yellow stripes which are indistinguishable from the rest of his yellow coat.</p>
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<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Never Been Human Before</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>In which Tobirama is not at all prepared for this. </p><p>Somehow he doesn't realize that his last life was worse than he thought it was.</p><p>Or Tobirama might be here to break the laws of science and twist reality to his whims but clearly the author is here to break hearts.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tobirama has never in his life (either of them) been on a team. He’s never had teammates, never had peers or equals, and he’s possibly only ever known a handful of people he might, at a stretch, be able to call friends. When he was younger he was the spare heir and the rest of the clan treated him as such, there was always a bit of distance between them and him. His love of reading over playing (his strange looks and the way he seemed to see the world in a way no one else did) isolated him from any cousins his age who might have been willing to let him join their games when they were younger and then he was the second strongest in the clan, the spare heir, the genius soldier who was busy inventing more jutsu to help protect the clan and he definitely doesn’t have time to go drinking like the rest of us so don’t bother even asking. </p><p>Father never sent him out in a squad. When not facing the Uchiha in outright warfare Father mostly sent him on three types of missions: courier, assassination, and information/technique gathering(theft). Tobirama was faster than anyone he might be partnered with so it made sense to send him with his summons on courier missions and running diplomatic errands that require speed and not getting caught while bringing information to and from allies. The assassination missions he was sent on are the kind that are supposed to remain secret, the ones where they and their client are most definitely not supposed to be implicated; assassinations like that are always easier to be done undetected with just one or two people and nobody else in the clan liked spending time around him so it just made sense to send him alone when he was more than strong enough to not need back-up. Then there were the other missions. The ones where he was sent out to use his mind that so easily breaks down and rebuilds jutsu to figure out how the other clans’ techniques work. </p><p>He was sent to ambush, and obviously kill, lone couriers. To draw them into a battle where he can observe their jutsu and then reconstruct them or something similar for the Senju to use and learn. Sometimes they were bloodline specific and he couldn’t find a way to replicate them, like the Akamichi expansion jutsu, but he figured something else out, like more efficient food pills, from the battles (and from looting their gear and dissecting their bodies later in his lab). Other times he was sent to chase down rumors of new technology that could benefit the clan and figure out how the new technology, a state-of-the-art plumbing system designed for a lord’s castle for example, worked or steal plans that the clan could use to replicate it. Father would pick a new ‘direction of study’ (clan or jutsu or technology to focus on next) once Tobirama figured out something useful or hit too many dead (hah) ends. </p><p>(Tobirama had never minded these missions too much, a lot of interesting discoveries were made because of them, but he still stopped assigning them to himself once Butsuma died and Hashirama left the mission assignments to him because Tobirama felt that secretly ambushing and killing allies was stupid because it weakened their forces, which in a time of need were your forces, and that even if he was to limit it to enemy forces there was much less satisfaction in learning things through such quasi-thefts than in discovering something completely new. He liked the challenge of figuring things out on his own and stealing technology and jutsu was less satisfying to him than designing them all on his own. But he did still go out looking at new technology when he had the chance, especially if it was civilian based like sewage systems and using gas to light civilian homes, and he brought it home to improve.)</p><p>So no, he’d never been on a team when Butsuma was alive. They were at war, he was a soldier, (he was so odd) and he was faster when sent on his own. (It is easier to deny responsibility for a lone shinobi who is just a bit too curious and just a bit too willing to push over the lines of propriety and ignore alliances in the name of scientific research than it would be to deny knowledge of a whole squad hunting down new research subjects, some of which were supposed to be untouched as allies.)</p><p>Then he was Hashirama’s heir and second in command and he’s too busy organizing missions and allocating resources and making sure the clan runs smoothly in the direction Hashirama wants it to go. (If they immediately raise the age at which their soldiers are allowed on the battlefield then he needs to improve the training of the ones that Hashirama will allow out of the compound because there are abruptly less shinobi available to guard each others backs and run missions to earn the money necessary to support the clan. You cannot just reduce your available forces overnight and expect no consequences Hashirama. Every single Senju authorized to leave the clan compound suddenly found themselves given a schedule for extra endurance, speed, and emergency first aid training.)</p><p>(You cannot just say “Everyone under fifteen is a child and is no longer allowed on the battlefield” and expect the fourteen year old blooded shinobi who has been running missions for six years already to passively agree, Hashirama. Tobirama invented D-ranks several years before Konoha was ever created to keep all the suddenly-no-longer-shinobi-but-definitely-not-children-anymore-after-what-they’ve-seen-and-done Senju occupied, he also had to arrange for an intensive training regime, rotating through anyone who was retired or not currently battlefield capable as teachers for whatever their specialty, to distract them. Pre-teens can be brutal. Traumatized combat capable pre-teens who were raised in a war-glorifying society are the stuff of nightmares. And no, Hashirama, none of them took the chance to ‘have a childhood’ just because that’s what you told them to do, because it was already several years too late for that.)</p><p>He was a soldier in a war that was fought primarily through one-on-one combat during larger over all battles, an occasional commander (Hashirama didn’t like to send Tobirama out without him and once Tobirama assumed it meant his older brother cared about keeping him alive just as much as he cared about keeping Hashirama alive but now he knows it was more about keeping his attack dog on a chain, wasn’t it), and he was his unmarried brother’s heir. For one reason or another everyone in the clan held themselves a little bit separate from him. Or perhaps he was held separate from the clan. But he was still a Senju, still a part of a clan and that was good enough (it had to be good enough). (He always had Hashirama, at least, he thought, he had a brother.)</p><p>When they built Konoha it was no different really. Suddenly he was in charge of writing laws and treaties and organizing a schooling system and roads and taxes and luring in civilians to live there and convincing clans to abandon their ancestral lands and join a brand new village. He had to drag a working economy out of nothing and even when he wasn’t the Hokage he was most definitely In Charge and too Important for people to treat casually. Any team he was on was likely to be an in-village committee or a diplomatic mission where he was (still) playing courier for Hashirama but it would be an insult to just send him alone. Then, the best thing, he was a teacher and his students were not his teammates. There’s a responsibility to guide and train and protect and keep alive that teachers have which even a team leader doesn’t. He loved his students but they were not teammates, were not friends. His was a position of authority over them. </p><p>(It’s lonely, being surrounded by people who do not see you as one of them.)</p><p>Tobirama has never been on a team. Now he looks at the two tigers who he is supposed to hunt with and thinks <em>I don’t know how to do this.</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Sorry, sorry, sorry. Just so you guys know it was a literal tie about what order I should post stuff so here's the first bit of 'option 1' and <strike>then we'll (finally) get into the hunt next time and</strike> then the conversation between Akari and Sōma after that. I promise!</p><p>Sudden influx of parents into my one bedroom apartment means no time to write and post stuff. Which is why this is late. But never fear, I'm still here to crush the heart and soul of our favorite Senju! (The goal here is to break your heart. Along with his. Is it working?)</p><p>Also, possibly good news? I've written another snippet from Poor Izuna's point of view about his reaction to Tobirama's banishment and (assumed probable) death. Which is going to be a chapter somewhere at some point. Even though it chronologically already happened three years before last chapter. Ah well. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ The first Izuna point of view chapter I wrote was set 6 years after Tobirama's 'death' so Izuna's just a pain in the un-chronological butt.</p><p>I'm dictating this bitter angst fanfic at my phone while driving these days because that's where I can get the privacy, guys it's sad. My mom was like what's the plan for dinner and I was like dunno I have some writing to get back to, excuse me while I go get in my car.</p>
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<a name="section0006"><h2>6. A Siren Sings Such Sweet Lullabies</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Beware the tongues of flame.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“So madam spider, what fly have you wrapped your webs around this time?” Sōma drawls as he slips into the clearing she is still lounging in not half an hour after her grandchildren left with Tobirama. He is too nosey, always showing up far sooner than she would like. But she cannot exactly stop him from listening to whatever gossip he hears on the winds.</p><p>“An intelligent little thing who already belongs far more to me than he does to any of the thieves that he once called kin.” She can hear the smugness in her voice, but Karen has picked a treasure this time and he was already hers before he left her clearing. It isn’t often that one so strong is so easy to claim. Those once-kin once-enemies of his fractured him so deeply it is easy to slip into the cracks and shape them to fit her. “He should have belonged to Manami if we did these things properly, but there are also several reasons he arrived in my territory. Karen made the choice and I have no doubt it was the best one.”</p><p>“Ah, so he was already hunted by his fellow thieves.” Sōma circles around her, never staying still, and she sneers at him in response; movement might make him more difficult to snare but if she really wanted to it wouldn’t stop her. “Or did our granddaughter just fancy a new chew toy?”</p><p>“Of course she does but she also wants to keep this one. And it is better than just him being hunted; it is his brother that leads them and he has already started hunting back.”</p><p>“Ooh, a man-eater, I can see why he is one of yours then. I don’t suppose you’ll introduce your new pet to Manami anytime soon?” He’s laughing at her now. They both know there’s no way she’ll share with Manami, of all their fellows she likes Manami the least, enough to almost be dislike, although Tetsuo is a very close second as smugly annoying as he so often is. Or perhaps she just doesn’t like that he is often able to counter her genjutsu since his own is just as strong.</p><p>“Perhaps eventually, once I have made certain the fires of his rage cannot be quenched by her influence.” Just thinking of how much cold still-water energy Manami would try to fill Tobirama with makes her want to snarl. Manami ignores the flowing implacable strength of water, probably because she thinks that as a sage she should remain calm and distant, in favor of still water, sharp ice, and slow to rouse hidden danger. None of which is bad but Akari dislikes favoring one aspect of your spirit over another (of course fire is passion and that can be rage or love or determination and smoldering embers waiting to flare-up or fast burning wildfire here and gone and she likes being so mercurial, the problem is that the only element that isn’t ever changing is earth and Manami likes to pretend otherwise). “Still I think I’ll take him to learn from Noriaki rather sooner. He might be water but there’s a strong undertone of lightning in his scent.”</p><p>“It means nothing that Noriaki has just the kind of cold passion you like in your minions.” Really, he sounds almost like he’s pouting. Did he want to play with her things now? Or was he being jealous again?</p><p>“Of course not. I have no idea where you get all these ideas from.” She makes a show of stretching and finally stands to rub against his side, it just wouldn’t have done to greet him any sooner and let him know he was her favorite.</p><p>“No, you wouldn’t have any idea where one might get the impression that you are full of plots, mistress of your territory that you are,” he lets out a pleased chuff as he leans into her. So he was wanting to make sure he still had some of her attention. How silly, all three of the grandchildren she sent with Tobirama are also his in some way. Of course he will meet the little summoner sooner than the rest of the streak.</p><p>“It’s good to have friends who know you for what you are.” She flicks her tail at him as she heads out into the woods.</p><p>“I don’t know how any of them miss it.” He follows quickly enough to keep his head level with her shoulder, following her without admitting it.</p><p>Soon enough he will realize that she is heading toward the nearest herd of prey-elk and pull level with her. “Chika is too literal to realize, Tetsuo can’t be bothered, and Manami knows but doesn’t care so long as I leave her territory alone.”</p><p>“And Noriaki? Is he a favored exception like myself?” There it is, he’s realized where they are headed and slowly lets himself drift further away from her, spreading out so they can hunt or preparing to leave.</p><p>“Noriaki enjoys my machinations because much like yourself he assumes he is above them.” Scenting the air she leaps out of the underbrush and into the trees for a stealthier approach.</p><p>“I’ve long since realized that none of us are safe when you want something.” For him to outright admit it, well, it seems he did not come to her just to make sure he got the first chance besides hers to influence Tobirama. He’s just flattering her now.</p><p>“So then do I have your support on this matter?”</p><p>“It does not effect me if you wish to amuse yourself with a new pet. I might even be convinced to teach it if you are willing to give me something in return.”</p><p>She huffs a single laugh, as if she will need to bargain. Not with Karen on her side. And even if she did she would send Hayate to give her the advantage. “I have no doubt. At the moment I have no plans for him that would need your involvement but it is good to know you’d be amenable to an exchange of favors. I believe I will offer to train him as a sage when they get back.”</p><p>“Ha, so you can twist yourself around him even further.”</p><p>“Well, is it my fault when someone volunteers to become mine?”</p><p>“Never if you are to be believed. But with that in mind I think I’ll take my own leave, lest your words become too compelling.” He seems to have realized she was roping him into hunting with her, well perhaps she won’t have help carrying her catch this time.</p><p>“I have never been able to bind you to me, such is the freedom of the wind, but you are always welcome back.” It is fun, roping him in as far as she can each time, just to see how tolerant he will be. Today’s conversation did not last nearly as long as she usually can get; he must be a little upset with her for accepting Tobirama, or perhaps for sending three of his grandchildren into the realm of the thieves. But he is the wind, he will change directions soon enough.</p><p>“And back I shall always come wandering. Keep our grandchildren safe.” So it was worry for their grandchildren that brought him to her this time. As if she would have sent them with anyone not fully capable of protecting them, as if Tobirama was not so desperate for a connection that he is already willing to die to protect them.</p><p>“Of course.” (As if Tobirama could not heal even a mortal wound if one of them were injured, as if he would not raise her grandchildren from the dead if he failed.) Sōma darts off after her assurance and she is left alone to hunt.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Tigers think of humans as sub-tiger, in the way that humans think of animals as sub-human and place more importance on the life of a human than that of an animal (generally). So, to a tiger the life of another tiger is more important than the life of a human, or even many humans. Humans have pushed their species almost to extinction and the tiger summons are mad about it. Honestly Tobirama’s face stripes are pretty much the only thing that saved his life, and Akari was definitely down for killing him the second he stopped entertaining her right up until she heard about what Hashirama and Madara had done, and what he was planning in return, and realized she kind of liked him because she could kind of relate to him and also, more importantly for the moment, that she could manipulate him and he is in some ways ripe for the picking. Tobirama is lonely, he is vulnerable, he is easy pickings for someone who reminds him of his old summons partners but who most definitely is not like them. The Sharingan is not the only way to cast a powerful genjutsu.</p>
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